First rezoning, now dog park: Deja vu all over again

I've noticed some grousing about Grand Forks city leaders taking too long to come to a decision. First was the saga of the UND neighborhood rezoning, which took more than a year during which time the City Council tilted from wanting to rezone to not wanting to rezone and back to wanting to rezone. The epic of the dog park has taken two years, during which the city tilted from a dog park at Lions Park to one downtown and now back to the Lions Park idea.

Dakota Huseby had a posting today criticizing the city's chronic indecisiveness and some City Beat readers have expressed similar sentiments.

I'm sometimes seen as being too friendly to City Hall -- I don't think my pals at the Alerus Center would agree -- but I think there's a good explanation for this tilting back and forth. And the explanation is this: Sometimes the least worst solution doesn't seem like the least worst until you take a closer look at the alternatives.

The initial decision to abandon Lions Park site had to do with the relatively high cost -- $49,000 or so. City staff then went for a really low cost solution, a downtown site isolated enough that it doesn't require fencing. Well, it turns out the council hates the thought of dogs running loose more than the thought of paying $49,000 (or more). It just didn't realize it until the fenceless idea came up.